I'm sorry, Conrad, but you're living in a dream world.

"We have to remember is that the primary purpose for gatherings relating to music is the perpetuation of the music not the support of professional musicians."

There are some musicians singing and playing folk music who have made it their life's work. If it were not for the fact that they get paid enough to make a living at it, they would have to turn to other pursuits to earn their livelihoods, and this would severely curtail their time and availability to make music for those people who are sufficiently interested in the music to be willing to pay a nominal amount to hear them.

In 1952, I attended a concert in a restaurant in the University District in Seattle. The concert was sung by Walt Robertson, who, at the time, had a television show on KING-TV in Seattle, and who had a Folkways record about to be issued. Walt, originally from the Seattle area, had first become interested in folk music while he was attending Haverford College in Pennsylvania and went to a couple of folk festivals at nearby Swarthmore College. There, he heard and met people like the Lomaxes and heard singers like Pete Seeger, Leadbelly, Josh White, John Jacob Niles, and many, many others.
        
When I heard Walt sing for nearly three hours that evening at The Chalet restaurant, I was completely enthralled by the songs he was singing:   work songs, love songs, sea songs, ballads, most of which I had never heard before. At the end of the evening, I said to myself, "I want to do that! To learn songs like those and sing them for people the way Walt Robertson just did." And hold them as spellbound as Walt had held me and the rest of the audience there that evening.

I believe the price of admission was something like a dollar. Negligible these days, but for a college student back in the early Fifties who had to count his pennies. . . .

But that was a very small price to pay for what I received that evening.

I knew practically nothing about music, and to do what I wanted to do, I had to learn. So I took classic guitar lessons (to learn how to play the guitar using my right hand fingers the way Walt did) and I took singing lessons to gain some control over my voice and try to bring out the best in it. As I learned, I realized that I really need to know something about music theory, so that I would know such basic things as what chords to play to accompany my singing. I could have worked by trial and error, and perhaps eventually learn what I wanted to learn, but I decided to do it the quickest and most efficient way. Voice lessons, guitar lessons, three years in the University of Washington School of Music and two years at the Cornish School of the Arts, along with private lessons in arranging with Mildred Hunt Harris and studying the English and Scottish Popular Ballads with Professor David C. Fowler in the U. of W. English Literature department.

I PAID for my lessons. And I paid tuition at the U. of W. and at Cornish. Not cheap!!

I sang here and there for free. Parties, informal gatherings (which we called "hoots" back before the word got preempted by the ABC network in 1963), and at such places as nursing homes and school classes. But once enough people had heard me perform, they began hiring me. And then I got the offer of a television series, and that opened the door for many other singing jobs. I have managed to make a halfway decent living at it. But I didn't get rich.

Along with sustaining myself, I have participated in many folk festivals, singing and taking part in workshops—for no pay. And, I might add, there was no attendance fee for the festivals. I have also sung benefits at retirement homes, for charitable organizations, and for various service organizations. Many of these engagements involve travel and on–the-road living expenses, most of which I am not compensated for and have to cover myself.

And after all this work and all this expense, YOU want me to give the fruits of all of this to you for NOTHING?

In the meantime, what am I supposed to live on? Are you going to provide me with food and lodging and the other necessities of life?

This is my profession, Conrad.

And I am not the only one. Most singers of folk songs who are at least halfway decent performers as well as hobbyists, whether they regard themselves as professionals or do it purely for their own enjoyment, have put in as much work as I have. They may not have all taken the same route that I took, but they most certainly put in the time, effort, sweat, and dedication to learn to do what they do. They give VALUE.

And just because it's folk music, that does not change the matter. If you think that people (such as you) should not have to pay to listen to professional performers of this material because it's folk music—"do-it-yourself music"—then I have a suggestion for you:

Do it yourself!

Time for a reality check, Conrad.

Don Firth